The present invention relates to distributed graphical user interfaces (GUI) for a joint slide show, e.g. a remote-slide-show GUI distributed over multiple user terminals in communication with each other over a network.
Localized Computerized Slide-Shows
Local computerized slide-shows are known in the art—FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary system. The system includes a user terminal 400 (e.g. laptop, mobile telephone, tablet, desktop, etc) where one or more microprocessor(s) (NOT SHOWN) execute a slide-show software application 404 stored in local storage 416. The slide show is presented on a display device 414 that is part of or in local communication with user terminal 400. Also illustrated in FIG. 1 is user-input device 418—for example, a mouse or touch-screen or keyboard. In another example, the user-input device 418 may include gesture-sensing apparatus to sense user gestures—e.g. a camera and image processing module(s).
As shown in FIG. 1, any number of users 60A, 60B may simultaneously view the display screen for joint viewing of the same slide show.
A discussion of computerized slide-shows is now presented—these features relate to prior-art localized computerized slide-show as well as to remote slide shows as described and claimed below.
The example will be explained with reference to a non-limiting ‘use case’ of a slide show having four pictures P1-P4 displayed in sequence (e.g. ordered sequence or ‘random sequence’ in ‘shuffle mode’). These four pictures P1-P4 are displayed in FIG. 2.
FIGS. 3A-3D describe presentation of the local slide show on display 414. FIGS. 3A-3D correspond to first, second, third and fourth frames at respective times t1, t2, t3 and t4.
In FIG. 3A, picture P1 is displayed at display-location 450 of display 414. At a later time, a ‘slide-show display-transition’ occurs so that picture P2 replaces picture P1 at display-location 450. Time t1 of FIG. 3A corresponds to the time immediately before the slide-show display-transition and t2 corresponds to the time immediately after the slide-show display-transition. For the slide-show display transition described by FIGS. 3A-3B, P1 is the pre-transition picture and P2 is the post-transition picture.
After this first slide-show display-transition, a second slide-show display-transition occurs after time t2 and before time t3, and a third slide-show display-transition occurs after time t3 and before time t4.
As noted above, FIGS. 3A-4D collectively describe three slide show display-transitions. Each slide-show display transition is characterized by respective pre-transition and post-transition pictures. FIG. 5 is a table summarizing the pre-transition and post-transition pictures for all three of the slide show display-transitions of FIGS. 3A-3D.
The slide-show display-transition may be triggered manually or automatically. In one example, user engagement of GUI control 452 or 454 triggers the slide-show display transition. Thus, in FIG. 4 the user engages GUI control 454 to ‘advance’ in the slide-show and trigger a slide-show display transition.
Alternatively or additionally, slide-show display transitions may be triggered automatically. For example, whenever an elapsed time since a most recent slide-show display transition exceeds a pre-determined threshold, user terminal 400 may automatically perform a subsequent slide-show display transition.
Every slide-show display transition is associated with respective pre-transition and post-transition pictures: (i) the pre-transition picture is displayed at display location 450 immediately before the slide-show display transition and (ii) upon carrying out the slide-show display transition, this pre-transition picture is replaced, at the display location, with the post-transition picture.
The example of FIGS. 3A-3D illustrate three slide-show display-transitions—the corresponding pre-transition and post-transition picture for each transition are shown in the table of FIG. 5.
It is noted that ‘display location’ (or the associated window) 450 is not required to be static—for example, in response to user input received via input device 418 the display location (e.g. center of the ‘display window’) may move, and the display window may be re-sized.
Remote Computerized Slide-Shows: The Problem
In contrast to the ‘local viewing’ system of FIG. 1, embodiments of the present invention relate to a remote system where first and second user-terminals are in remote communication with each other, for example, via a packet-switched network such as the Internet. In the local system of FIG. 1, co-viewing of a common slide show by first 60A and second 60B users is trivial—they can simply sit in front of a common screen and the first person can put all desired pictures in a common folder and then run a software tool that slide-shows those pictures.
In contrast, if the users are located in two different and possibly remote locations, this is much more difficult to achieve. One possible solution is that the person having the pictures will send all the picture files to the other person, either by emails or through a file sharing service like Google Drive. Then the other person will put the picture files in a common folder and will run a software tool to view them in a slide show. The problem with this solution is that in addition to being cumbersome it also does not provide a true sharing experience. The first person may want to add verbal comments and explanations while the second person is watching a specific picture. Even if the two persons coordinate a common session by having both of them start the slide show at the same time and having a phone call in parallel, it would still be difficult to achieve the same level of sharing experience as when in the same room. For example, if the first person needs more time for commenting on a specific picture and needs to freeze the slide show on that picture because of that, he cannot directly stop the slide show on his friend's screen.
Another possible solution is to use one of the many commercially available desktop sharing software tools. Using such tool the first person can play the slide show on his screen with the second person remotely viewing a copy of that screen. While this solution may solve the sharing experience issue it suffers from the disadvantage of exposing the first person's screen to the second person. The screen may contain other windows, not related to the shown pictures, which might contain private and confidential data. Sharing the desktop might therefore result in privacy violation. In addition, this solution also suffers from relatively long delays between the time of switching to a new picture at the first person's screen and the time the second person sees the new picture on his screen.
Exacerbating the situation is the fact that remote terminals are typically in communication with each other via packet-switched networks where the amount of time required for pictures sent from a source terminal to remote terminals is not known a-priori. Thus, for multi-slide slide-shows, the operator of the source terminal does not always know which remote terminals have received which pictures of the remote slide show.
There is an ongoing need for apparatus and methods for improved joint viewing of slide-shows by remote terminals in communication with each other via a computer network (e.g. a packet-switched network).